The Dragons of Archenfield - Edward Marston

I got lucky in The Works and found another 3 of Edward Marston's Domesday series and have been happily working through them this week. It's coincided with starting a new job at Waterstones so I'm properly immersed in books at the moment (fun) and Marston's light style is about right to come home to with a head stuffed full of till functions, and stock protocols. 

The Dragons of Archenfield is book 3 in the series, a bonus seeing as I'd started with book 2, and follows similar lines - the Domesday book commissioners set off to Hereford this time, where there's trouble with the Welsh, a colourful Archdeacon in a very smelly cloak to deal with, and Ralph Delchard meets a woman he really likes. 

I'm not sure that there's much more to say - the mystery was satisfying with a couple of likely suspects to keep me sort of guessing a good way into the book, although I think the how and why are more important here than the who. 

Marston is good at keeping the period detail to a minimum too, just enough to give a bit of atmosphere, not enough to get bogged down in or to start picking holes in either which would be an unwelcome distraction. 

Altogether I can only repeat what I said about The Ravens of Blackwater - that this is a well crafted book that's solidly entertaining without demanding very much of a tired reader. It's quite formulaic, but the formula works - like when you follow a recipe and get an excellent cake so there's no criticism implied in that, and this series really is proving a good find to me.